South West Arm - PH

[sydney south]

Was down the end of South West Arm - PH early last Sunday Morning.

The water was alive with fish jumping, so rigged a line with bread, another with a prawn and then was casting a lure toward what looked like a school of Taylor.

Then the school swam right beside the boat and it was made up of what I think was large mullet.

Dropped the baited hocks in the middle of the school and all they did was swim around the baits.

They hung around for a good hour and then moved on.

Anyone else seen anything like this lately?

[Fab1]

A few weeks back when fishing at night there were massive schools of bait fish swimming around my boat.Not sure if they were mullet or pilchards or something else as i couldn't see them clearly.Yowie will probably have a better idea.All I know is the same happened to me when trying to catch them as they weren't interested at all.

[Yowie]

They are sea mullet. A few jumping last week in the mouth of S/W Arm.

Not all schools of mullet head out to sea at the same time for their spawning run up north, and not all mullet go on a spawning run, have seen a few stragglers over the years that stay inside Port Hacking.

Very hard to entice to take any bait. Still a couple of very small schools of sand mullet over the weed beds but they have almost disappeared as well.

[sydney south]

They are sea mullet. A few jumping last week in the mouth of S/W Arm.

Not all schools of mullet head out to sea at the same time for their spawning run up north, and not all mullet go on a spawning run, have seen a few stragglers over the years that stay inside Port Hacking.

Very hard to entice to take any bait. Still a couple of very small schools of sand mullet over the weed beds but they have almost disappeared as well.

Thanks Yowie,

As I thought.

I saw a huge school of Sea mullet swimming against the tide, directly under the Forster Bridge over Easter. There would have been 10k plus of the buggers.

[budzsta]

My pop used to catch mullet like crazy in the George's.

He would use a bread crumb, flour dough.

Sometimes he would just buy a big round loaf and then soak it and mash it up.

Then he would suspend a hook about 1 meter under a float. He would wait till the float drops under and strike.

Would often catch a bunch and then curry them.

[Yowie]

Thanks Yowie,

As I thought.

I saw a huge school of Sea mullet swimming against the tide, directly under the Forster Bridge over Easter. There would have been 10k plus of the buggers.

The biggest school of sea mullet I saw was at Lake Illawarra many years ago. The school stretched from near the entrance, under the bridge, along the main channel and into the lake. One continuous stream of mullet, a metre or 2 wide.

[exhail]

Was catching them in botany near the heads last week, there was a school of them. We were casting small plastics in the centre of them. Great fun on light gear. I kept one to eat as it was huge and I've haven't tried them before, it was delicious.

I don't usually keep fish out of botany, but a couple of fillets weren't going to kill me.

[Mullatt]

Thanks Yowie,

As I thought.

I saw a huge school of Sea mullet swimming against the tide, directly under the Forster Bridge over Easter. There would have been 10k plus of the buggers.

I was up there in may last year and on the outgoing tide over a number of days, there also was a continuous flow of mullet going out to sea. Literally millions of them.

This is where some of them ended up

Was chatting to some of the pros who were netting them . This pic was taken about mid morning and he was saying that after they went to the coop at Tuncurry they were put on a truck and would be in Sydney later that arvo and on a plane to various asian countries that night. Apparently all the money (massive $'s) is in the roe, the flesh just goes into petfood.